Italy: Don’t Look Now, But . . .

Oh goody. While everyone awaits tomorrow’s vote in Greece, and struggles to find out whether the recent fillip to Spain’s banks will work, there’s this squib in today’s Barron’s:

Italy is moving into the crisis cross-hairs. That development has chilled any euphoria over the recent Spanish bailout package. Italy hasn’t yet taken international assistance, but its debt-to-GDP ratio stands at 120%. The euro’s end game is Italy, says Ed Altman, a finance professor at New York University. Italy is “too big to save,” says Altman, who fears the euro will survive only if Italy avoids a bailout.